


Purpose

by eveshka



Series: Tales of the Dawn King [24]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Gen, Here There Be Spoilers, you know the drill
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-30
Updated: 2017-05-30
Packaged: 2018-11-06 22:34:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11045730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eveshka/pseuds/eveshka
Summary: Gets hard, you know. Doing it alone.





	Purpose

**Author's Note:**

> Rating: T  
> Warnings: None  
> Characters: Gladiolus Amicitia, Cindy Arurum  
> Time Period: 22 years post-Dawn  
> Location: Hammerhead

His 54th birthday was yet another spent atop the hill overlooking Insomnia and nursing the contents of a shot glass. Alcohol was becoming abundant again, but Gladio was a stickler for the old stuff and the last source of old Insomnian whiskey was starting to go spare. He allowed himself one shot every year on his birthday and that was that.

Twenty-two years had passed since the Dawn, and four years after he’d buried Aranea. Her grave was the newest, and it had finally gone over to flower. He’d tended all the graves, even the one that wasn’t supposed to be there, and then settled his chair by the edge of the cliff; poured himself his shot, saluted the dead, turned and saluted the city, then sipped the shot quietly.

He hated this. Hated all of it, this sick little ritual that had become his birthday. And yet, he couldn’t tear himself away from it, couldn’t change. He’d tried. Last year, he’d hung around the garage, getting in Cindy’s hair and becoming increasingly churlish until she’d ordered him to the hill.

They were rebuilding the Citadel in Insomnia now; he could see the construction in the distance. Old rubble was being cleared away, areas that were deemed dangerous torn down to bare earth. A few of the homes nearby had barely survived through the years, the Amicitia manor being one of them.

Gladio had no desire to go back. Iris had gone almost ten years ago, before the manor had been torn down, and she’d come back with tears and a few aged mementos. He’d let her take them all, telling her that the Amicitia were gone.

They’d argued that very morning about it: she’d come to Hammerhead for his birthday and tried to give him something that had belonged to their father. Gladio had refused it, reminding her that the Amicitia had fallen with the Lucis Caelum and Scientia. They were names better in a museum, or best yet, lost to the past with the memories of the old kings. She’d fled in anger and tears, and he’d stalked out to his car, driven out to the edge of civilization and planted himself in his proper place: with those he’d stood beside in battle.

 

Footsteps in the grass drove Gladio out of the darkness of his thoughts, and he turned to see Cindy standing there, a bottle in her hand and her hat at her side. “Thought you might like some company.” The breeze ruffled her hair and she looked at him for a moment, as if waiting for permission to come closer.

He grunted, finished his shot of whiskey, and waved her closer. “Not much company myself, but you’re free to hang around if you want.”

“Gets hard, you know. Doing it alone. And I’m not sayin’ that Iris was in the right, I’m just sayin’ I know how you both feel. We’re all orphans of this here world, and it beats us down ‘til we can’t see our way out of it.” She settled onto the grass beside Gladio, letting her feet hang over the edge of the cliff and popped open the bottle, taking a drink before offering it up to the bigger man in the chair.

He took the bottle, sniffing at the contents, and then took a hesitant taste. Lemons and sugar, but something else in there too. He didn’t taste any alcohol, but that was okay. He’d long given up getting drunk. Like many things, it had lost the point for him. “It’s all gone. Everything the Amicitia stood for, everything my family did… it’s lost. So I ask you: what good is a shield that has nothing to protect?”

“Sugar, you’ve got plenty to protect. Just look around. You protect me, and Hammerhead.” Cindy motioned to the graves before taking her lemonade back. “You protect them.” She took a drink from the bottle, and swallowed, then spoke again. “Thing is, you spent so much time protecting others that you’ve forgotten how to protect yourself.”

“What do I need protecting from? I’ve outlived damn near all of them. You, Iris, and Talcott’s what’s left,” Gladio rumbled, staring at the distance and deliberately not pouring himself another shot, which was something he would have done long ago.

The bottle was shoved into his hand by the woman sitting at his feet. “Yourself, you big behemoth. You’ve got a heart, and you wear it on your sleeve.” She thumped his leg with her small fist, and turned her sparkling eyes up at him. “Nothing wrong with that, sugar, but you forget to give yourself a break.”

He harrumphed, looking out over the water towards the city and grumbled under his breath for a moment. “Yeah, you’re right. As usual. When did you get to be so damn smart anyway. Feel like I’m talking to Ignis all over again.”

She laughed, a bright and cheerful sound that echoed over the water, shaking her head. “Me? Naw, I’m not half as smart as Ignis was. I just know hearts need protecting, that’s all.”

“That why you up here?” He passed the bottle back.

“Mayyybe. Could be I loved someone once and lost them just like you did. Hell, it’s an amazing wonder that any of us are still here, what with all we've lost recently. Just look around; Lucis is like us. Torn and beaten, scarred and worn. But not broken. Not broken.”

Silence fell then, and Gladio didn't quite know what to say. He'd come up here angry and seeking a good sulk, but it was hard to sulk when you were sharing a bottle of lemonade with a friend who knew you too damned well. Finally, he took the bottle, drank from it, and sighed. “I'm being an idiot.”

“Yup.” Her lips made a little popping sound on the ‘p’ for emphasis. “But you're our idiot, so we kind of have to keep you.”

“Thanks,” his wry voice was a rumble, and it was echoed in the distance by thunder.  “Mmmmph. Sounds like we’d better get back.” The far away sound agreed.

“Afraid your hair will get messed up?” Cindy laughed, but she rose from her spot next to his chair, and took the bottle, finishing the contents and waiting for Gladio to stand.

“No, that was Prompto’s fear. I’m more concerned about slipping in the mud and breaking something,” Gladio replied, rising and snagging the chair. It collapsed as intended, and he slung the thing under his arm. “Cindy… I want to tell you something, but I need a promise first. I need your sworn oath that what I tell you won’t ever be spoken of again.”

Blonde curls bounced as Cindy tilted her head and looked at Gladio for a long moment before she nodded. “All right. I swear that whatever you tell me here will stay in my heart.”

He searched her eyes, and then nodded. She’d done right by all of them before; he had no expectations that she wouldn't this time as well. “There’s four graves. Not three.”

She straightened a little, blinking, and brought her hand up, fingers moving as she counted. One. Two. Three… she repeated the action, and then shook her head and looked to Gladio. “Did you find the Lady then?” Her voice was soft, for she understood what a pained loss that was to them all.

He felt his eyes sting, and looked out over the water. “No,” but he didn’t speak further. His voice had left him and he couldn’t make the sounds that formed the name he wanted to say.

“ _Oh_.” It was an exhalation of breath, a sudden understanding. She knew, and she’d sworn to keep it in her heart. “Good. I think it’s better that way.”

He hadn’t expected her to hug him, hadn’t thought she was the hugging type. But she stood there and hugged him and they watched the storm start to rain on Insomnia, and Gladio thought it was enough.


End file.
